RESEARCH

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RESEARCH

Welcome! We are a research team at the Rowland Institute at Harvard University lead by Mackenzie Mathis, PhD. Using machine learning techniques and mice as a model system, we aim to understand how neural circuits contribute to adaptive motor behaviors.

Research

Executing successful movements requires the brain to predict the consequences of actions. It is believed that the brain builds internal models of our body and the environment in order to simulate the sensory and motor outcomes of movements.

Due to the constant changes in our body and environment (for instance, those due to fatigue, tool-use, or disease) these models require constant re-calibration, called motor adaptation, to keep us moving in predictable ways.

Where in the brain these models reside, how they are formed, and how they are updated following bodily or environmental changes remains unclear.

The goal of the laboratory is to reverse engineer the neural circuits that drive adaptive motor behavior. We hope that by understanding the neural basis of adaptive motor control we can open new avenues in therapeutic research for neurological disease, help build better machine learning tools, and crucially, provide fundamental insights into brain function.

Here are some questions that guide us:

how are internal models represented in the neural code?

what are the sensory and motor cortical contributions to motor adaptation?

how are multiple areas across the brain efficiently sharing information during learning?

how do (biological) neural networks enable lifelong learning?

behavior, models, & neural data

We believe behavior is an essential component to understanding neural function. As part of our quest to better understand behavior, we develop new tools to study more complex and natural movements. We develop tools, like DeepLabCut, to perform markerless pose estimation and behavioral analysis from any species in a multitude of settings. We also have developed a set of skilled motor tasks where mice can learn from a dynamically changing sensory landscape.

By combining concepts from machine learning and optimal motor control with the power of the mouse's genetics and accessibility, our lab aims to uncover fundamental principles that guide motor adaptation, learning, and motor control.

We are using the latest techniques in 2-photon and deep brain imaging (including utilizing multi-area imaging with a 2-photon mesoscope), to uncover the neural correlates of adaptive behavior. We use optogenetics and chemogenetics to test what roles diverse areas have during behavior. Furthermore, we develop new computational models and tools to generate testable hypotheses and analyze our data.

Gary completed his PhD at Princeton, working on neural circuits of decision-making in rats. He joined the lab in July of 2018.

Kai Sandbrink Masters student

Kai is completing his master thesis from ETH in the lab. He joined in March of 2019.

Eric Hepler Animal Technician

Eric joined the Rowland in the fall of 2017, and provides technical support to several Fellows labs. He works with us on maintaining our precious mouse colony!

Tom BiasiUndergraduate student

He is a freshman at Harvard studying computer science. He joined the lab in March of 2019.

Michael BeauzileUndergraduate student

I'm an undergraduate sophomore pre-medical student at Boston University studying Biomedical and Electrical engineering. My interests include psychology, neuroanatomy and nanotechnology. He joined the lab in March of 2019.

Alumni:

Adrian completed his master's thesis in the lab through the University of Tübingen in 2018. He received a BS in Physics from Heidelberg University. Adrian is now a PhD student in the group of Prof. Helmchen in Zurich.

Melody Tong - Undergraduate Researcher|Harvard College Class of '18- Melody was co-mentored by Mackenzie and Nao Uchida. Her thesis work was focused on characterizing a rapidly learned freely-moving reaching & pulling task in mice. She is now attending medical school at NYU.

Funding

Funding

Funding:

We gratefully acknowledge the funding sources that make our research possible:

Adrian Hoffmann (masters student) joins the lab!

Jan 2018

Tanmay Nath, PhD (Postdoctoral fellow) joins the lab!

Dec 2017

September 1st, 2017

The lab doors are open!

August 2017

Our very talented friend, Taiga Abe, who completed his Harvard College thesis (Analysis and modeling of movement kinematics in a mouse model of motor adaptation) with Mackenzie, Alexander, and Nao, started his PhD graduate studies at Columbia University today! Congratulations!

May 2017

We will be presenting new work at NCMDub this week! Stop by our poster cluster to learn more about our past and future work.